Carnivals

I come to the letter "C".  So I thought of Bubba's namesake, my daddy, Clayon.  But I've blogged about Daddy a couple of times and mentioned tidbits about him and his family in other entries.

So to be more original, I'll talk about carnivals.  When I was growing up, most of my times at carnivals were because one of my older sisters took me.  Mama and Daddy were old enough it didn't much interest them. 

Then when I got up to be an older teen, two or three of us girls would be dropped off together to go to a carnival or the South Texas State Fair.  I always loved the rides.  Part of my whole love affair with the excitement of the dark, the cool of autumn, and the strength and power of winds.  Liberating!  Exilerating!

While I was in college at SFA, I met a carnie named Randy and started dating him.  That was awesome in several ways.  Free rides, free food.  I'd light out on the weekend and go whereever in the area that they were set up.  Once they were on Galveston Island.  I went down for the weekend.  In comes a hurricane....mild one.  Just so happens that song 'Hurricane' by Leon Everette was out about that time.  Me and Randy and another couple cruised all over the island in my Mustang in the wind and rain.  A local country radio station was playing the song over and over.   Seemed fun at the time.  Back then there hadn't been a terrible storm anywhere near us since Carla.  No one except folks in terribly low spots ever evacuated for hurricanes.  In hindsight, the lyrics of the song almost sound like a challenge to mother nature. 

But I digress.  Daddy and I went to the fair with Buford and Cherrie Jo Curtis back when he was working for him.  That's where the old picture of him with the bandito guns and me in the saloon dress came from.  Your daddy got to playing a game on the midway that he turned out to be very good at.  We took home a pile of stuffed toys.  They later made the beginnings of what he added to out of the mechanical machines for Bubba' hammock in the corner of his bedroom when he was born. 

Daddy, Bubba and I went to the fair for the rodeo one year before Bug was born.  Pete was working for Triple S and they had a couple of hands entered in the rodeo.  Then we all went off to a big party afterwards.

Bug got to go the the carnival once or twice when she was little, but as of  yet has never been to the fair.  I remember when she was an older toddler, we went and Bubba took her up the huge slide and came down with her.  I believe the swings that went round and round were her favorite.  Too hard to go when I've been the only one working.  Although a couple of years back I did manage to take her to a carnival one more time while she was still young enough to enjoy it the most.

Well, that's about it for carnival memories.  So, I'll leave you with knowing mama's all time favorite ride at the fair was the Hymalia.